wherein Liz does the crossposting thing again

I am slowly cranking into gear on crossposting my old Harry Potter fanfiction to AO3. I posted three fics tonight and will try to keep going at roughly that rate until I'm done. That will take a while. *sigh*

I've decided not to bother corralling most of them into any sort of collection. I have a handful of stories that use the OCs and/or the Weasley family backstory I created for "Secrets" and "Five Years Is a Lot of Later"/"First You Have To Get There," but which have no other connection and may, in fact, contradict each other in various places. I'm just going to link to "Secrets" in the author's note section of each relevant fic so people aren't left wondering who on earth Apple Rumluck is or what is up with the story of Ginny's childhood friend making her practice kissing a feather pillow. There's also the question of "Eden," "Shame," and "Fire" -- the latter two being direct expansions of sections of the former -- but again, I think that's probably best handled with links or maybe a series, not a collection.

It's weird looking through these stories. They're a decade old, on average, and I like to flatter myself that I've improved as a writer since then. I've also sort of... narrowed down what I'm good at? It's not that I've stopped experimenting, but I was experimenting back then, too, and there are reasons I don't write in first person anymore. *wry* The kind of information I put into story metadata, and the phrasing I use in doing so, has also changed a lot -- some of which is just me getting older, but some of which is also due to changing fandom mores. For example, I don't think I've written a disclaimer in years. (I was still copypasting them into ff.net crossposts, but that's more for consistency of presentation than anything else.)

I've also been updating my own copies of each file as I go, since most of them are in Word 1997-2003 format. Yikes!

wherein Liz does the college thing

As of one hour ago, I am officially registered for the Fall 2 term at Empire State College's Center for Distance Learning! I am taking one class, on the economic history of the west. My course materials should arrive from the college bookstore next week and the class itself will begin on October 27th.

Vicky very kindly stayed on the phone with me while I negotiated the registration interface, reset my forgotten password, experienced literal cold feet, and wrote a check for the largest amount of money I have ever paid anyone all in one go. I am so glad I have a sister. We don't see each other in person very much these days, but there's a lot of comfort knowing she'll always have my back when I need her. (And I will have hers, too, of course! It goes both ways.)

This year has been wildly up and down for me -- more down than up, I think -- but this right here? This is a good thing. :-)